AMERICAN LEGION BASEBALL: Bears No. 1 seed in District 22 playoffs

Bears top seed in District 22 playoffs

Storm Coffman is one of several pitchers in the arsenal of the Metro East Bears Senior American Legion baseball team heading into the District 22 playoffs.

Storm Coffman is one of several pitchers in the arsenal of the Metro East Bears Senior American Legion baseball team heading into the District 22 playoffs.

Photo: Nathan Woodside File Photo | For The Telegraph

AMERICAN LEGION BASEBALL: Bears No. 1 seed in District 22 playoffs

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Pitching and defense, defense and pitching.

The Metro East Post 199/Post 126 Bears have plenty of it, no matter which way one slices it, and because of it, the Bears believe there is a deep run to be made now that the American Senior Legion playoffs are about to begin.

For the Bears and five/four other teams, it all starts with the District 22 Tournament, which begins tonight and runs through Friday around various sites.

The Bears (29-7), who closed the regular season with a doubleheader win on Saturday over Shelby County Post 289/Post 611/Post 725 by winning 3-2 in the opener and 9-0 in the nightcap, head into district postseason play as the No. 1 seed and will be hosting games at home sites as long as they are in the double-elimination tournament.

Belleville Post 58 goes in as the No. 2 seed, followed by third-seeded Highland Post 439. Valmeyer Post 901 will be the fourth seed and play at Highland tonight, and Smithton/Freeburg Post 907/Post 550 will play at Belleville tonight in another first-round game.

The Bears feel they are pitching deep despite the uncertainty of Andrew Yancik (bicep strain) and having lost hard-throwing righty and Evansville-bound Austin Ruesch because of elbow issues.

The Bears can stack any of the following on the mound, including Kade Burns, Storm Coffman, Brandon Hampton, Andrew Frank, Isaac Garrett, Tyler Lewis, Tage Wargo and Zach Seavers on the front end or in relief mode and perhaps Corey Price in a closer’s role.

Having a deep pitching staff, one that doesn’t accumulate a ton of strikeouts but does get its fair share and one that relies on a strong defense will be key for Metro East’s chances moving forward.

“You’d like to have Andrew Yancik back in there, but yes, we have the depth of throwing a lot of guys,” Bears manager Ken Schaake said. “Garrett is probably only at three or four innings, but everybody else are somewhere at least over 10. I think Hampton is around 30 or 40 innings. Burns, same way, maybe a little more now that he threw seven (on Friday). We have a lot of guys who can throw, and we made it a point in throwing them here.

“… Pitching and defense, yes. The offense will take care of itself. If you’ve got pitching and defense, you can win the one-run, two-run ballgames. If you don’t have the pitching, then you better be scoring a lot of runs.”

The depth of a pitching staff with this ballclub reminded Schaake of recent past teams that did quite well in the postseason.

“In 2003, I had six starters,” he said. “I had Shaun Seibert, Nathan Culp, David Scott, Nick Sievers, (Steve) Mueller and Jonathan Goebel. I had six pretty good ones, and 2008 was a good staff also when we were down in Marion (for the Fifth Division Tournament).

“This one, I probably used nine guys over 10 innings thus far in the season. Tate Wargo’s probably got 16 innings. But yes, this is a good one. Unfortunately, I told Ruesch we could not use him any longer because his elbow would just never recover in a timely fashion and I didn’t want him to go to Evansville with a bum arm.”

The Bears locked up the top seed with a 6-0 win over Smithton/Freeburg last Friday and finished 8-2 in the district, which was tied with Belleville but by virtue of going 1-1 against east other, Metro East won out in the tiebreaker based on run differential in the two head-to-head meetings.

The Bears remembered what it meant to be at a disadvantage last year losing out to Highland with Highland having the advantage of a bye.

“Home field advantage is definitely big, especially after last year, what happened in Highland,” catcher Steven Pattan said. “Our pitching is deep. I think we have more consistent starting pitching. I think that can take us a long way.”

“It makes a huge difference to at least start off with a bye,” Schaake said. “By the time you face some people, you’re one pitcher ahead in your rotation than they are at least.”

The winner of the district tournament punches a ticket to the Fifth Division Tournament, which will be hosted by Highland this year, so Post 439 gains an automatic spot into that tournament.

Games will be played at Optimist Field’s Glik Park July 17-20.

“We’re excited going into the postseason,” Burns said. “We’re looking to make a pretty deep run.”